Wife gets 33 years for conspiring with kids to kill husband

August 20, 2009

A former northwest Indiana woman was sentenced to 33 years in prison today for her role in conspiring to kill her husband with her teenage children.

Judy Denise Parker pleaded guilty last month to conspiracy to commit murder in the shooting death of her husband, John Parker Jr. 33, according to a news release from the Office of Lake County, Ind., Prosecutor Bernard Carter.

Her son, Daniel Lee Hicks, had also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and will be sentenced Sept. 14 to a term of 20 to 25 years in prison. Judy Denise Parker's daughter, Christina Hicks-Grabski is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 17 after pleading guilty to assisting a criminal, and faces up to 8 years in prison.

Carter said the conspiracy started on June 11, 2002 and ended with John Parker Jr.'s murder outside his Merrillville business on April 17, 2003. The family had lived together in an upscale subdivision in Crown Point.

Authorities said Judy Denise Parker gave money to her son to hire a killer. When that failed, authorities said, she gave the children money to buy a .25-caliber pistol and her son dark clothes, a mask and instructions on how to murder his stepfather and make it look like a robbery.

"She told him to return to their home after the murder, in which Dan ambushed Parker and shot him in the back of the head," the news release stated. "She instructed him to shower to get rid of evidence and Judy Parker later disposed of her husband's wallet, her son's clothes and the gun."